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Turkey's Erdogan says impossible to pull troops out of Iraq

Xinhua, December 11, 2015 Adjust font size:

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Thursday that withdrawing Turkish troops from Iraq is out of the question and added the soldiers are in Iraq as part of a training mission.

The deployment of Turkish troops dates back to 2002 and the additional troops were deployed in 2014 in response to a request from Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Abadi, Erdogan told a press conference.

"Turkish troops in Mosul are not there as combatants; they are trainers. Their numbers may vary depending on the size of Kurdish peshmerga troops. It is out of the question, for now, to pull them out," he said.

Erdogan also commented on Russia's proposal to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to issue a statement against Turkey's deployment of Turkish troops, saying "the UNSC rejected the proposal, we will follow the process regarding the incident. However, Turkey has chosen to cooperate with the international coalition against the Islamic State (IS)."

The crisis was triggered over the weekend as reports stated that a Turkish training battalion, equipped with armored vehicles, was deployed near the city of Mosul in order to train Iraqi paramilitary groups against Islamic State militants.

However, Ankara claimed that sending troops to Iraq was in response to increased skirmishes with the IS in Mosul, the capital of Nineveh province which has been under IS control since June 2014.

Earlier this week, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi urged NATO to force Turkey to immediately withdraw its troops from Iraq.

Turkish troops are in Iraqi territory "without the knowledge nor permission of the Iraqi government, and Iraq demanded via diplomatic channels that Turkey immediately withdraw its troops, within a maximum of two days," a statement quoted Abadi telling NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg during a phone conversation.

"The situation violates Iraq's sovereignty, and NATO must use its power and force Turkey to immediately withdraw its troops from Iraqi territory," read the statement.

An earlier statement by Iraq's Council of Ministers, headed by Abadi, said "Iraq's sovereignty and its geographical borders are a red line particularly since there exists no signed agreement between Iraq nor any accord permitting Turkey to trespass the country's borders under any pretext."

The council declared that it authorized Abadi to take the necessary measures regarding the deployment of Turkish troops in Iraq. Endit